they come, they eat, they leave
by Fading Butterfly Wings
Summary: Young Princess Atta doesn't think her day can get much worse after a rough morning of royal lessons, but then some unexpected visitors show up the island and prove her wrong. She and her sort-of-friend Flik must band their wits and bravery together if they hope to make it home unscathed.
1. Chapter 1

**Don't worry, _Leave Her Alone _is still my main priority! This is just a li'l side project to switch things up and keep the creative juices flowing. The events in this take place way before the movie, meaning it features the baby Flik and Atta shenanigans we all deserved. Enjoy!**

**-fbw**

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"You come back here and apologize, young lady!"

Atta pushed aside the stalks of grass in her path with a vengeance, ignoring her mother's demands that grew fainter with each footstep she took. She would say sorry for what she said to her mean old tutor when he said sorry to her. Right now, she needed to get as far away from both of them as possible.

Atta's lungs felt on the verge of bursting when she finally reached a clearing. She stopped, took a few gulps of air, and brushed away the tears forming in her eyes. Being an angry crier was the most frustrating thing in the world. The last thing Atta wanted when she was mad was sympathy, but it was hard to strike fear into the hearts of her fellow ants with tears streaming down her cheeks.

Once her eyes were mostly dry and her breathing was back to normal, Atta took in the scene before her. About a foot from where she stood were several holes, one big one and four smaller ones, surrounded by clovers and filled with water that sparkled in the spring sunshine.

The odd shapes of the puddles brought to mind a conversation Atta had recently overheard between her mother and her teacher, Mr. Soil. Mother was expressing concern about a cat roaming these parts, fearing for the safety of her colony, but Mr. Soil assured her that cats generally left ants alone.

_In fact,_ he'd noted with a shudder, _it might even help them to have one around, what with the abundance of birds born this time of year._

Atta liked Mr. Soil. He was always kind and patient with her and the rest of his students, never belittling them if they zoned out for a moment or didn't know an answer to one of his questions.

Mr. Cornelius, on the other hand…

_Stop twiddling your thumbs. Princesses don't fidget._

_Did you hear anything I just said to you, or was your head in the clouds like it always is?_

_Your sister's ten seasons younger than you and she's more ready for the throne than you are._

Mother always said Atta would learn to appreciate Mr. Cornelius's strict teaching style when she got older, but Atta didn't think she'd ever appreciate being made to feel stupid for the entirety of the time they spent together. And they spent a _lot_ of time together. She wished she could stay in Mr. Soil's class all day with the rest of the ants her age, but being the Queen's daughter meant she had to learn about things the other kids didn't, like council meetings and census-taking and the most efficient way to collect food for the grasshoppers. Those things just didn't come naturally to her the way math and science did, and her tutor made sure she knew it.

Atta bowed her head and brushed her fingers along the leafy top of the crown she wore. How could something so light feel so heavy? She slowly slid it over her antennae and held it before her, gazing down at the teardrop-shaped sap that accented the middle leaf.

Then she drew back her arm and flung it forward as hard as she could.

The crown sailed through the air in a perfect arc, the teardrop glinting in the sunlight. It landed in the center of the big puddle with a faint splash, and Atta smiled smugly. _Take that, Mr. Cornelius._

Then her heart dropped and she sprinted to the puddle's edge.


	2. Chapter 2

To Atta's relief, her crown was too light to sink.

To Atta's dismay, her throwing arm was stronger than she'd realized.

The crown floated a good ten inches from where she stood on the bank of the puddle. Atta groaned as she assessed her surroundings, hoping to find something long enough to stretch across the water and pull the crown back to her, but the clover trunks were too thick and there weren't any twigs in sight. Did she really have to do this?

That question was answered by the mental picture of her mother's face if she came home with a bare head.

Atta took a deep breath and rose slowly into the air, her very non-waterproof wings buzzing behind her. _Okay. This is fine. You can do this. Just fly over, grab the crown and go. Easy. You don't even have to touch the water. _She wasn't aware if her comforting words were confined to her mind, but it didn't matter. Everyone in the colony knew about her habit of talking to herself.

She was halfway there when a sudden movement in the corner of her eye caused her heart to leap in her chest. Atta flew a little faster, trying her best to ignore the sense of terror gnawing at her insides. _It's fine. You're just being paranoid again. Just get the crown and get out of here._

Her fingertips had just grazed the crown's top when it happened again. This time, there was no denying the movement. Atta watched in frozen fascination as something that looked like a rolled-up tube of grass sticking straight out of the water grew closer… and closer… and closer...

And then she saw a pair of eyes beneath the surface.

Atta didn't even have time to react before she felt water splash over her and saw her crown inches from her nose, gripped by a bright blue hand.

"Didja lose something, Princess?"

The reflex came so naturally it stunned her. Atta's hands flew to her mouth as Flik clutched his nose, repeatedly saying he was sorry even though _he_ was the one who'd just been punched in the face. Boy, was she learning her own strength today.

"_Flik!" _she squealed, equal parts annoyed and apologetic. "You scared me! What are you doing in there?"

Her victim's voice sounded decidedly more nasally when he spoke. "I'm so sorry, Princess! I just wanted to go for a little swim to test out my latest invention."

Now it was one hundred percent annoyance. "_What_ invention?"

There was unmistakable pride in Flik's voice even as he nursed what was quite possibly a broken nose. "I call it the Underwater Breather," he said, holding up the tube Atta had seen earlier with a flourish.

"That piece of grass lets you breathe underwater?"

"Yeah! Wanna try it?" Flik's eyes lit up as he extended his treasure towards Atta. When she didn't take it right away, his confidence visibly faltered.

"Oh, sorry… guess that's kinda gross, huh?" he said, retracting the tube and absently rubbing the mouthpiece with his palm. "Totally get it, especially with that weird sickness going around the anthill. If you want I can make you a whole new one!"

Atta laughed. "No, no, it's not that. I just prefer to stay up here where it's dry. Not a big fan of water and… wet." She sounded like an idiot.

"Ah, gotcha."

A moment of uncomfortable silence followed, broken only by the gentle swishing of water against Flik's arms as he moved them in circles to stay afloat. Her crown bobbed beside him, and Atta realized with guilt that Flik must have dropped it after her knuckles made contact with his face.

This was the longest conversation Atta could remember having with the odd boy since three seasons ago, when they were assigned to work on a science project together in elementary school. They had gotten along pretty well in the beginning, probably owing to the fact that they were both loners in their own rights: a shy queen-in-training who spent a lot of time with her royal tutor and a geeky kid who spent a lot of time doing weird, dangerous things by himself. Atta had even thought maybe they could stay friends after the project was over.

However, when the school science fair ended with an emergency evacuation thanks to the secret ingredient Flik had added to their baby fungi when his partner wasn't looking ("It was supposed to make them grow faster, not explode!"), any desire Atta had of maintaining their friendship vanished. The evacuation was kind of funny, but the failing grade was not.

And the lecture she received from Mr. Cornelius the next day was _really_ not. The memory alone was enough to make Atta's face burn even now. "_How can you expect the colony to have any respect for you as a queen if they can only think of you as the princess who almost killed them with mushrooms?"_

"Um… Princess? Do you want this back?"

Atta was snapped back to the present by the sight of a soggy crown waving back and forth before her face.

"Oh… yes, thank you," she sighed, taking it from Flik's hand and giving it a few good shakes. Tiny droplets flew off, making ripples in the water. "Mother would've killed me if I lost another one."

Flik cocked his head. "How'd it end up here in the first place, anyway?"

"I, um… I threw it."

"Oh."

Another pause.

"Bad day in princess school?"

Atta started at the question. She'd forgotten how bold her former partner could be. And not in a rude way. More in a completely-lacking-social-skills way. Her first instinct was to paste on a queenly smile and sarcastically deny the idea that there could be anything less than delightful about being yelled at by a stooped old man for three hours straight, but then she saw the genuine worry in Flik's eyes and felt a lump rise in her throat.

"You could say that," she whispered instead. Tears sprang to her eyes and she quickly turned her face to scrub them away. She wouldn't give Mr. Cornelius the satisfaction of making her cry twice in one day, especially in front of another ant her age. Even a weird one like Flik.

It grew quiet again, which seemed like as good a time as any for Atta to make her exit and spare what dignity she had left.

And then Flik's voice piped up. "Do you want to talk about it on dry land?"


	3. Chapter 3

**Yikes, how embarrassing! Thanks to the anon reviewer who pointed out the mistake when I first posted this chapter - something went wonky with the formatting and I had no idea until I read your comment. Enjoy the third chapter ~without~ all that HTML jargon ;)**

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Atta had no idea how much time had gone by since she first stormed into the clearing and chucked her crown into the puddle. She and Flik were sitting side by side on the bank of the puddle, idly swinging their feet back and forth over the cool water, talking about nothing and everything. Their conversation had started with Atta's recount of her awful morning with Mr. Cornelius, ending with her secret suspicion about her tutor's feelings for her mother.

"It's bad enough that he's so mean to me, but then he makes these weird googly eyes at Mom when he thinks I'm not looking."

Flik responded to this with the appropriate expression of disgust. It made Atta like him even more… until he asked, "Then why isn't he nicer to you if he thinks you might be his future daughter-in-law?"

"Flik!" She punched him in the arm at this, not nearly as hard as the blow to his nose but enough to make him wince even as he laughed. A violet bruise had already begun to bloom right in the middle of her victim's nose, which she felt a little less terrible about now. "Don't even say that. Gross."

The discussion had trailed from here into who liked who in the colony ("I'm telling you, Dr. Flora has eyes for Mr. Soil!"), what they were learning about in school ("What did you get on your anatomy-of-a-seed test?"), how hot the summer had been ("Mom said four ants have passed out carrying grain already"), and the annoyance that Atta's little sister was ("Now that she can walk she tries to follow me everywhere. Just imagine the day she learns to fly!")

Eventually the two of them grew quiet for a while, but it wasn't an awkward quiet. Atta felt strangely comfortable around Flik in a way she did around few others. Which was probably why she found the thoughts that had been bubbling beneath the surface all morning spilling out of her mouth.

"It's just… I don't know if I'm cut out for the queen thing. My mom says that's silly, of course I am, but she has to say that. I know Mr. Cornelius wouldn't disagree with me. Neither would the rest of the council. And I'm…"

Here Atta paused, fiddling with the now dry crown that was sitting on her lap. Her eyes welled with tears. Flik sat still beside her, waiting for her to gather her words.

They came out in a whisper as she turned to her friend. "I don't even want to be queen."

There. She'd finally said it, had put the truth out there into the atmosphere. Her chest felt suddenly lighter, but her cheeks were burning and her heart was pounding. She averted her eyes from Flik's before she could read too much into the way he was looking at her. He was the first ant she'd ever told that to.

Another moment of silence passed, punctuated only by a cricket chirping somewhere in the distance. Atta felt nausea building in her stomach, already regretting the decision to admit such a shameful secret. What if he told everyone else? What if he didn't look at her the same? What if he thought she was weak?

She was on the cusp of making a quick exit when she felt unexpected warmth over her right hand and looked down to see Flik's hand on top of it. It took her a minute to find the courage to look back up at him and see an expression in his blue eyes that made her racing heart skip a beat.

"You don't have to be a queen with me," he whispered.

Atta felt a shy smile creep across her lips. Now she was at a true loss for words, but not in a bad way.

A distant blare sliced through the still spring air, effectively killing the moment. Both Atta and Flik started at the sound and immediately scrambled to their feet. The realization that her crown had tumbled back into the water was overshadowed by the realization that Flik hadn't let go of her hand yet.

She locked eyes with Flik, who looked as bewildered as she felt, and both those realizations were overshadowed by a greater one.

"They're here," he breathed.

"They're early," she breathed back.

Already Atta could hear the sounds of panic rising from the colony. The grasshoppers who came every year to collect their food weren't supposed to be here for another week, and Mother always made sure everyone was safely inside the anthill before they arrived. Atta didn't know what would happen if she and Flik were caught outside the anthill when they got here, but she didn't intend to find out.

"Come on!" she cried, yanking Flik forward and beginning to run in what she hoped was the direction of the anthill. He stumbled a step or two and then fell into pace behind her. Their fingers were still interlocked and Atta couldn't tell if the dampness she felt was from her palm or his.

Atta had underestimated how deep into the clover forest she'd run in her blind anger. Both she and Flik were panting with exertion, and still it felt like they weren't any closer to their destination. She heard the faint call of her mother from somewhere far away and wanted to scream back that she was okay, that she was sorry, to please wait for her and make sure she was safe.

Atta suddenly became aware of low droning that was growing louder with every step she took. Her heart plummeted to her stomach when the sky darkened and she pressed on, not daring to look up and see what was blocking the sun.

"Wait!"

A sharp tug on her shoulder pulled her up short. She turned to see Flik standing still as a stone, staring up at the sky in a wide-eyed stupor. Misshapen shadows flitted across his face, an eerie pattern of light and dark.

"What are you doing?" she demanded. The shrill fear in her question seemed to snap him out of his trance.

"We'll never make it back in time!" Flik yelled, his words nearly drowned out by the droning. "I know a place we can hide until they're gone!"

Atta stared at her friend. His eyes showed fear, but his brow was furrowed with something else: determination. She thought again of her mother, how worried she must be, how the last conversation they'd had was a fight. She swallowed the lump in her throat.

"Okay," she said, and her own voice was lost in the chaos. "I trust you."


	4. Chapter 4

Atta's pulse pounded in her antennae. She and Flik were weaving through dandelions trunks and grass stalks, running faster than Atta had ever run before, and still it didn't feel fast enough. The grasshopper gang's shadow blotted out the sun now, cloaking everything around them in gray. How many were there? Did the colony even have enough food for all of them?

She was so lost in thought she didn't notice Flik had stopped until it was too late. "Ow!"

"Sorry, Princess!" His apology was muffled by the droning, which was only just beginning to fade. "We're here!"

Flik let go of Atta's hand and scurried toward a thick plant in the middle of their path. Atta took in the surrounding area, noted that it wasn't all that different than the one they had just left, and tried to ignore the panic swelling inside of her.

This was Flik's brilliant idea for a shelter? What were they supposed to do, huddle behind the plant and hope the grasshoppers were bad at hide-and-seek? She felt her chest tighten and willed herself to focus on breathing like Dr. Flora had taught her. In, one two three. Out, one two three.

Flik was now circling the plant with his hand on his chin, oblivious to Atta's crumbling composure. "Now let's see, I know it's around here somewhere…" he murmured. In, one two three. Out, one two three.

The sun returned. The droning stopped. They had landed.

In, one two three. Out –

"Aha!"

Flik grinned and jumped up, grabbing hold of the edge of a layer that had begun to peel away from the rest of the stem. It rolled downward even more under his weight, revealing a hole in the side of the stem that was just big enough for an ant to crawl through.

Atta's jaw dropped. "How did you know…"

Flik picked up a nearby pebble and set it on the edge of the blade to keep it from curling up again, then ran back to Atta and grasped her hand. She didn't even mind that it was sweaty.

"I know all the secrets out here," he whispered, his eyes bright with mischief, then pulled her forward until they reached the pebble.

"After you, Princess," he said with a dramatic flourish of his hand.

Atta rolled her eyes, smiling in spite of herself. She set her foot on the blade and took a few wobbly steps forward before resorting to her hands and knees. She had almost reached the opening in the stem when she heard it.

"Molt, how could you get us so lost?"

Atta stifled a scream and swiveled her head to look at Flik, who had just crawled onto the edge of the blade behind her. She could tell from his expression that he didn't know the voice, either.

"Don't move," he mouthed. She nodded, silently cursing the tears pricking her eyes. Mean old Cornelius's words came to mind. A queen never cries in front of others. It wouldn't do to let the ants looking up to you think their ruler is weak.

Hearing his voice only made her want to cry more, so she switched it to Dr. Flora's instead. Breathe, Atta dear. Everything is going to be alright. Count with me, okay? In, one two three. Out, one two three. In, one two three. Out, one two three. In –

"Hoppy, you know road trips make me hungry!"

A new voice. There was more than one.

"Flik!" Atta hissed, feeling the tears spill over her cheeks. She couldn't care less if he noticed. "Do something!"

Flik stared at her with fear in his eyes, and she realized that even the inventor was at a loss for ideas.

A nearby clump of clovers rustled. They were going to be caught.

And then Flik's left foot shot out behind him and dislodged the pebble holding the blade in place. Before Atta knew what was happening the blade had sprung into the air and sent both of them tumbling into the darkness.

They landed in a tangled heap at the bottom. Thankfully wasn't too far of a drop. Atta's eyes took a moment to adjust to the inside of their hiding spot, which was lit by the soft blue glow of fungi lamps. The brief glimpse she'd caught of the rest of the room on her way down had given her the impression that it was empty.

Of course, she couldn't know this for sure yet because her view was now obscured by Flik's worried features. "Are you okay, Princess?" he whispered.

Atta clamped a hand down hard over his mouth, hoping her glare was enough to get the shut up, you idiot message across. She then strained her antennae, which were still ringing from the roar of the gang's arrival, to see if she could pick up any other sounds outside. It was eerily quiet inside the makeshift bunker after all that ruckus. Atta could almost make herself believe they'd just imagined those two voices.

Several minutes passed in silence before she deemed it safe to remove her hand from Flik's mouth. He slowly rose to his feet, then reached his hand down to help her up. The upward motion caused a rush of blood to Atta's head that made her sway in place. Flik lunged forward with his arms open, ready to catch her should she fall. She held a finger out and pressed her lips together, determined not to let that happen. He took a sheepish step back.

Once the dark specks cleared from her eyes, Atta took a moment to properly assess their shelter. The inside of the plant housed a circular space much larger than it appeared from the outside, probably just big enough to hold a Blueberry troop. Her eyes fell on a pile of leaves resting on a slab of bark beneath a large mushroom in the back of the room, and the corner of her mouth twitched at the sight of the words "Underwater Breather" scrawled across the top of one of them. Was this where her nerdy friend did all his brainstorming?

"Okay," Flik said, interrupting her speculations. He was kneeling beside the hole they had fallen through and peering up through the tunnel at the faint light trickling in from outside. "Whoever we heard probably found their way to the offering by now, and it usually only takes them approximately twenty minutes to eat, right? So we'll hang out here for a half hour or so, just to be on the safe side, and then…"

His plan was cut short by a sound that made every hair on Atta's body rise. It was the most horrifying thing she'd ever heard – something between a shriek and a growl – but it wasn't the noise itself that made her arms and legs tremble like leaves in wind.

It was the fact that whatever made that sound was right outside their hiding place.


	5. Chapter 5

Atta pressed down hard over her own mouth to hold in the scream she felt coming. She and Flik stared at each other in silence for what felt like ages as they listened to the sound outside. Over time it faded from a shrieky growl to a snuffling noise, kind of like the sound Aphie made when he was…sniffing for food.

She chose not to dwell on that last part.

"What do you smell, boy?"

It was the first voice they'd heard earlier, the one that had berated its companion for getting them lost. Something about the tone of it sent cold shards of fear trickling down Atta's spine. She'd heard that tone plenty of times in Mr. Cornelius's voice, usually when he was interrogating her about being late to lessons or accusing her of cheating on her memorization drills.

The snuffling got louder. It was only a matter of time before they were found.

"Hey Hop, check this out! Do I look regal to you?" It was the second voice, the one referred to as "Molt." This one didn't have the same terrifying effect as the other. In fact, it sounded downright jolly.

"Where did you find that?" There was a pained screech and the sniffing suddenly stopped. Atta sighed in relief.

"It was just floating in a puddle a few feet back," Molt replied. "Can you believe it? Who would leave a crown like this layin' around like that?"

Flik's eyes widened. Atta's hands flew from her mouth to her head and were met with bare skin.

No, no no no nononononono…

In all the chaos of the last few minutes, Atta had forgotten to grab her crown out of the water before she and Flik fled. The crown that had been preserved and passed down through four generations was now sitting atop some stranger's head. She would be the first ant in the royal line to lose it. Mr. Cornelius would never let her live it down.

Which didn't really matter anyway, because Mother was going to murder her.

Atta covered her face with her hands and took several shuddery breaths through her fingers. She could feel the panic rising again, and this time Dr. Flora's soothing words were drowned out by a voice that sounded like her tutor's.

You fool! What have you done? Just wait until the colony finds out their future queen is an irresponsible airhead who can't keep track of her own crown.

She was startled from her spiral by the feeling of a hand on her shoulder. Instinctively Atta slapped it away.

"Leave me alone!" she hissed, no longer caring if whoever was outside heard her.

A few seconds later the guilt settled in and forced her to open her eyes. Flik stood before her, his outstretched hand frozen in mid-air.

"Flik…" Atta whispered, now overwhelmed with shame as she took in her friend's wounded eyes and bruised nose. This was the second time today she had rewarded his attempts to help her with violence. What was wrong with her? "I…"

Flik took a step backward, the expression on his face slowly shifting from hurt to something else. Without any warning he turned and scrambled up the tunnel that led outside.

"Hey!" she heard him shout. "You guys have something that belongs to my friend, and she needs it back!"

Silence followed. Or maybe it was just that all sound was drowned out by the rush of blood to her antennae.

Atta ran to the tunnel's opening, nearly tripping over one of Flik's blueprints in her haste, and stuck her head inside. Flik's feet, legs, and thorax were the only parts of him she could see. The rest of him was exposed outside their hiding place.

"Flik, what are you doing?" she demanded, her voice shrill with either fear or anger. Probably both. "Get back in here!"

It was unclear whether he hadn't heard her or was just ignoring her. Before Atta could repeat herself, the mean voice – "Hop", she remembered Molt calling him (he'd called him "Hoppy," too, but that name didn't quite fit its owner) – asked a question that made her insides shrivel like a flower petal in the sun.

"So where exactly is this friend?"

There was a pause.

"Yeah!" Molt chimed in. "Why doesn't she ask for it herself if it's so important?"

Atta hoped Flik could feel the thorn daggers she was shooting into his back.

"Uh… she's…she's not here right now," he stammered. "It's – it's just me, but I know it belongs to her and she wants it back. So…can you please give it to me?"

Flik's pitiful request was answered with sharp laughter. Even Atta couldn't help rolling her eyes. He was in trouble now.

Well, they both were, but right now he was the only one visible to...whoever was out there.

Curiosity overcame her. Moving at roughly the pace of a newborn snail, Atta leaned forward and began crawling up the tunnel until she reached a sliver of light where the blade began to separate from the stalk, right below Flik's toes. Shutting one eye, she turned her head and peered through the crack with the other, waiting for it to adjust to the sunlight.

When it finally did, she gasped.

Atta had never seen a grasshopper in real life before, but the creatures before her matched the diagrams she'd studied during the species unit of her science class. Even so, she was shocked by how big they were. These ones couldn't have been much older than she and Flik, but even from here she could tell they would tower a good two or three inches above even adult ants.

Well, the ones who were standing on two legs, anyway.

The other one, the one that stood on six legs, was like nothing Atta had ever seen before. It looked like a grasshopper that had disturbed a hornet's nest and lived to tell the tale. Its yellow eyes darted back and forth as though searching for prey, and every once in a while its tongue would flicker out between the ropes of saliva hanging from its open jaw. There was a leash around its neck attaching it to one of the other grasshoppers, like the one Aphie sometimes wore when Atta took him for a walk around the anthill.

Once in a while it would stray too far into the clovers surrounding them and the grasshopper holding it would give its leash a savage tug, causing it to scuttle back to his feet with a whine. One look at this grasshopper confirmed that he was Hop, the one with the voice she didn't like. Tall and lean, he carried himself in a way that made Atta certain he was the oldest in the group. His right eye was cloudy, slashed through the middle by a jagged scar, and the expression on his face was somehow both a smile and a scowl.

The other grasshopper, Molt, was the one wearing her crown. Shorter and rounder, he looked like he was trying to summon every mean bone in his exoskeleton and still coming up short. Atta noticed something like tiny pieces of pollen drifting from his body and realized with shock that it was his skin.

Flik's voice rang out above her. "There's no one else here!" he insisted. "I mean it! It's just me, and I want that crown back."

"I have another idea," Hop said. "You tell your friend to come out from where she's hiding, and then I'll let Thumper here eat both of you for a snack."

He reached one of his arms out and snapped. The crazed-looking grasshopper – Thumper – sprang forward with a growl like the one they'd heard earlier, teeth bared and arms outstretched. Atta shrank back just in time to avoid being seen. A cloud of foul-smelling breath hit her and she gagged.

Hop watched it all happen with a smirk. He was holding the leash firmly enough to keep his pet from reaching Flik, but just barely. Atta could feel the ant above her trembling, but even in the face of a grasshopper trying to tear his head off he refused to back down. Her heart swelled with pride.

Suddenly Molt's voice cut through the chaos.

"Hop, maybe w-we should just give it back," he said, toying with the crown on his head. "I can just have Ma make me a new one. Besides, she's p-probably gettin' worried about us…"

"No," Hop interrupted. He yanked hard on Thumper's leash, bringing it to the ground with a yelp as he stared Flik down, a wicked glint in his unscarred eye. "Finders, keepers."

Atta wasn't sure this was even about the crown anymore.

"Flik, come on," she whispered. Thumper's antennae shot up and it began shaking its head in frantic search of the source. Atta lowered her voice until she could barely hear herself. "It's okay. Just let it go. Please."

Out of the corner of her eye Atta saw Hop tilt his head the slightest bit and she froze, her heart hammering in her chest.

Then he lowered his gaze and time screeched to a halt. He saw her. He was looking at her, eye to eye, through the slit in the stalk.

His face broke into a grin. "Why don't you come out and say hi, Princess?"

The ground gave way beneath her.

No, wait. It was just the tunnel shaking. Why was the tunnel shaking?

Atta looked up just in time to see Flik's feet disappear as he leaped from the top of the blade and landed at the grasshopper's feet.


End file.
